December Book Haul [Book Haul #6]

Hey y'all! So clearly, I'm just eating my words all over the place lately, aren't I?! Remember how I said that my last book haul was probably my last book haul of the year? Oops. I bought more books. But this is definitely, absolutely, the last book haul of the year. PROMISE. Cross my heart and hope to die. Starting in the new year, I plan to do a book haul every two months rather than just doing one whenever it's ready.

But let's not waste any more time with introductions. Let's just jump right into it!

The Kingkiller Chronicles

Book 1: The Name of the Wind

Book 2: The Wise Man's Fear

by Patrick Rothfuss

I'd been planning to get The Name of the Wind for quite a while and finally ordered it off of Amazon. I hadn't planned on buying The Wise Man's Fear quite yet (although I'd definitely been considering it), but then I happened to find a used paperback copy at a used bookstore for only $6. And it was in pretty good condition so I just couldn't pass it up. I'm so anxious to read these that I plan to read The Name of the Wind before the end of the year and then start the year by reading The Wise Man's Fear.

Black Beauty

by Anna Sewell

The used bookstore near my school has some really pretty editions of classic children's novels, and I've been eyeing this one for a very long time. I included this book in my 30 Books Before 30 post (link here), and since it was fresh in my mind, I decided to finally go ahead and buy it. I read the kid's version several times, but I've never read the real thing, so I really need to get onto that.

The Wizard of Oz

by L Frank Baum

Contrasting the situation with Black Beauty, I actually did read the real version of this book when I was younger, and I really enjoyed it. And this version of the book was also at the used bookstore near my school, and it's even more beautiful than the Black Beauty one, and I just couldn't pass it up.

Obligatory BookOutlet Purchase...

(Black Friday Edition)

Ten

by Gretchen McNeil

I was immediately intrigued upon learning about this book. because it's a retelling of my favorite stand-alone novel, And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie. Do I expect it to be great? Nope. Nothing deep, nothing amazing, just a fun, fast-paced read. And if it's so bad that all I can do is laugh at how bad it is, that's great too!

Through the Ever Night

by Veronica Rossi

This is the second book in the Under The Never Sky trilogy. I don't have the first one, and I haven't read it yet, but I do like to marathon series if all of the books are out. I've been planning on reading this trilogy for quite a while, and this was less than $3, so I decided to get it and just go ahead and get books 1 and 3 when they're back on BookOutlet for cheap.

The Lost Code

by Kevin Emerson

This is the only book of the haul that I kinda just bought on a whim. All of the other books, I'd at least had an eye on for a little while. But I just came across this one while doing my Black Friday shopping and decided to add it into the cart. From the synopsis, it sounds like a really fast-paced dystopian with an interesting world. And it has a male lead, which is rare in a YA, so that should be really interesting.

The Final Empire

by Brandon Sanderson

I'm not exactly sure why the name of the series is HUGE on the cover, and the actual title of the book isn't even on the cover, but that's beside the point. I've been wanting to read this series for a while now, and the first book was less than $3, so I decided to go ahead and get it. I also included this in my 30 Books Before 30 post, so you can check that out here if you want to.

No One Else Can Have You

by Kathleen Hale

This seems like a really great, really cheesy, murder mystery. And those are just buckets of fun. I actually saw someone haul this a while back (can't remember who) and so when I saw it on BookOutlet for really cheap, I decided to go ahead and get it!

The Chronicles of Nick

Book 3: Infamous

Book 4: Inferno

by Sherrilyn Kenyon

I just love that BookOutlet has all of the books in this series for so cheap. I already have books 1 & 2, so I'm just adding on to my collection so that I can marathon these in the future. It seems like it's going to be really great!

Ruins

by Orson Scott Card

This is the second book in Orson Scott Card's Pathfinder series. I don't have the first book yet. It was on BookOutlet and was in my cart, but went out of stock before I could get a copy. So I just have the second book, and plan to get the first one eventually. I've heard lots of good things about these books, so I'm really excited to get into them!

So there you go! That's my last book haul of 2014! Hopefully, in the new year, I'll buy books at a slightly slower pace. I need to work on that.

I've started doing Booktube a little as well, so if you want to check that out, you can click HERE. I plan to post most of my videos to my blog, but just in case I miss one or decide not to post it on here, that will keep you up-to date. 

I've also created a Facebook page for my blog, so if you want to check that out and like it, you can click HERE. I'll try to keep that pretty up-to-date with new posts and such.

Thanks for reading! If you like my posts, I'd really appreciate if you'd subscribe/follow so that I know you're enjoying what I'm posting! See y'all soon!

My "BookTubeAThon" Challenge!

Hey, y'all!
So if you're at all familiar with the BookTubeAThon, then you're probably very confused right now. Actually, you're probably just as confused if you don't know what it is. Allow me to explain.

The BookTubeAThon is a Youtube-based reading marathon that has taken place the past two years and was created by and is hosted by Ariel Bissett.  Basically, BookTubeAThon occupies a single week, and during that week, you attempt to read as much as possible. There are also several challenges that you can attempt to complete throughout the week if you so choose. Oh, and one other thing... it took place from July 14th- July 20th.

So, you're probably wondering why I'm talking about it now. It's a whole month later. Well, if you've followed my blog, you know that throughout the month of July, I challenged myself to read the entire Pendragon series. Unfortunately, that kept me from being able to fully participate in the BookTubeAThon. I was able to get a lot of reading done on my series by doing twitter sprints, but I was really sad that I didn't get to try and complete any challenges, because reading through a series in order doesn't necessarily cater to the challenges.

So, what I decided to do was to take a week in August (which was originally planned to be last week, but that didn't happen) and to attempt to complete all of the BookTubeAThon challenges. So, August 18th- 25th will be the week where I'm attempting these challenges, and after that's over, I'll let you know how I did.

Now, let's get into the challenges and see what I decided to read to complete each of them!

1) A book with pictures

The Shadowhunter's Codex by Cassandra Clare and Joshua Lewis

This book has a lot of illustrations throughout it. I just recently read all of Cassandra Clare's books except this one, so I figured that I might as well read it since it's a companion to the series. Plus, it's pretty short and I think it would be easy to finish it really quickly. 

2) Start and complete a series

The Chronicles of Prydain by Lloyd Alexander

This is a middle-grade high fantasy series that's 5 books long. They're all very short, so it shouldn't take me very long to get through them, which is really good for a read-a-thon.

3) A book with red on the cover

Animal Farm by George Orwell

As you can see, my copy has quite a bit of red on the cover. I picked it partially because it's short, but also because it's Ariel Bissett's favorite book ever and I'm interested to see if I really like it as well. 

4) A book that someone else picked for you

Memoirs of a Teenage Amnesiac by Gabrielle Zevin

I collected a pile of 5 books to do this one. Each book completed either the "a book with red on the cover" challenge or the "a book from the genre you've read least this year" challenge, so that I could knock out two birds with one stone. Then, I had my roommate choose a number between 1&5 and she chose 4, which landed on Memoirs of a Teenage Amnesiac, which is interesting because this is also another of Ariel Bissett's favorite books and she's the one who caused me to get it.

5) A book from the genre you've read least this year

Memoirs of a Teenage Amnesiac by Gabrielle Zevin

This one is doing double duty. Like I said up above, each of the books in that stack could have completed a second challenge, and for this one it was "a book from the genre you've read least this year" because I've completed a single contemporary book... although by the time this post goes up, I'll hopefully have finished one more!

6) Read a book and watch the movie adaptation

The Chronicles of Prydain by Lloyd Alexander

One again, this one is doing double duty. The Disney movie, The Black Cauldron, is based off of this series. From what I've been told, the movie is not just based on just the book "The Black Cauldron" but I'm also under the impression that the movie doesn't cover the entire series either. I don't know. But The Black Cauldron is one of my favorite Disney movies, and it's extremely underrated. I'm excited to see how great its source material is!

7) Read a total of 7 books

If you count up all of the books I'll be reading throughout the week, you'll see that I'm reading 8 books, so I'll definitely be completing this challenge!

I also made a video back around the time of BookTubeAThon discussing what I would be reading, so here's that if you're at all interested in watching that...

So, those are the books that I will be reading starting tomorrow (Aug 18) and going through the rest of the week. I'm not sure which book I'm going to tackle first, so we'll just have to see how things unfold! Hopefully, at the end of the week, I can do an update post saying how well I did, but I won't go into my opinions on the books, because I plan on doing a series discussion on The Chronicles of Prydain, and plan on including the stand-alones in my next Stand-alone discussion post. So watch out for those coming soon!

I've also created a Facebook page for my blog, so if you want to check that out and like it, you can click HERE. I'll try to keep that pretty up-to-date with new posts and such.

Thanks for reading this! If you like my posts, don't forget to subscribe/follow, since it lets me know that you're enjoying what I'm doing. See y'all soon!

The Pendragon Adventure Book 5: Black Water Discussion [Summer Reading Challenge]

Hey, y'all! I'm here with another summer reading challenge post! I'm continuing on with my July challenge: The Pendragon Adventure!

Series Info

Since this series is a little less well-known than the other series in my Summer Reading Challenge, I decided to discuss the premise of the series as a whole. The Pendragon Adventure is a 10 book series centered around our main character, Bobby, and his adventures through multiple dimensions (or territories, as they're called in the books). The books are told from a dual perspective. Our main perspective is of Bobby, told in first-person through journals which he sends to his best friend to keep a record of what is happening. The secondary perspective is of Bobby's best friend, Mark, and pseudo-girlfriend, Courtney, who receive the journals and go through their own problems on Earth. The majority of the books focus on a single territory each, as Bobby travels there to thwart the evil Saint Dane.

Book Summary
As always, remember not to read this if you haven't read the previous books in the series, because this summary will probably spoil you for any books that came before this one!

After Saint Dane's first victory on the territory of Veelox, Bobby follows him and Gunny to the territory of Eelong. On Eelong, the jungle cats called klees are intelligent and treat the humans, called gars, like slaves. The tension is mounting between the klees and the gars, and the only way to save the territory may be to break the rules.

Overall Thoughts

Non-spoiler section!

You're probably surprised this is going up so soon after my post for The Reality Bug. Honestly, I kinda am too. These late-night BookTubeAThon Twitter sprints are really helping me get through books. I finished up The Reality Bug during Monday's sprints, and got 325 pages into Black Water during Tuesday night's sprints! Then today (Wednesday!) I pushed through the last 100 pages. And when I finish this post, I'll be starting Twitter sprints again. Whew. It really is a reading marathon!

Anyway, on to the actual book. I liked it more than I remembered liking it. I've never been a huge fan of Eelong, and at best, I'm indifferent about Kasha, the traveler from Eelong. As I've said many times, I tend to prefer the books that take place on the territories I like the best. That may be why my memory was a bit cloudy as to how good this book is. The plot is excellent. The end of Reality Bug/ beginning of Black Water is kinda the turning point of the series. Things start to get more confusing, the plots get more intricate, and it becomes harder to figure out what exactly Saint Dane is really up to. I like that because the series really ages as the characters do.

As I said, I'm not a fan of Eelong. Since I can't remember a ton about some of the other territories that the series hasn't touched on yet, but I can tentatively say that this is my least favorite territory. If it's not my absolute least favorite, then it's at least in the bottom three. It's dangerous to even walk around on solid Earth and humans are treated like animals. No thanks!

Also, I forgot how exciting Mark and Courtney's plot-line is in this book! I totally forgot about what they had going on in this book and the part that they played in everything! I think that's what helps the plot out. Not only is Bobby's plot really interesting, but Mark and Courtney get an even more interesting plot than they got last time.

As far as rating, I'm going to give it around a 4.5. It may vary a bit in the end, but I'm going to go with 4.5 for now.

Spoilery Discussion!

First of all, the ending. THAT ENDING. I remembered that it happened, but it's just... whoa. As if Kasha dying wasn't bad enough, Spader and Gunny got trapped on Eelong. Honestly, I just feel bad for them. Of all the territories to get trapped on, they're stuck on EELONG. That just sucks. And Spader finally had his head on straight and was going to be a great asset to Bobby, which is such a bummer. At least Bobby's continuing on to Zadaa, where he has his best asset- Loor. But the loss of Spader and Gunny is damaging. Also, does anyone else picture Morgan Freeman as Gunny? Just me?

I love that Courtney and Mark jump into the action. I was yelling at them the entire time for using the flumes even though they could tell things were going wrong, but I knew that was what they needed to do because they had no other way of helping Bobby out. They couldn't get in touch with the real acolyte on Eelong. I guess they could've gone to the guy who was the previous acolyte on Second Earth and asked him for some names, but he's pretty grumpy and not helpful. Either way, I loved getting one long narrative with everyone attempting to save Eelong. It made the book super action-packed. Plus, we got to see Cloral again, which is always great.

Honestly... I don't have a ton more to say about the book. It's not my absolute favorite in the series, but I do think it has a really great plot. And I love that all of the characters band together to save Eelong. I hate that this spoilery discussion is so short, but that was really all I had to say about the book.

Favorite Quotes

Page 58: "Tell you what," I said. "I'm going back home, to Second Earth, where humans are humans and cats pee in a litter box. If this Seegen character wants my help, he can find me there. Let's see how he likes dealing with a world where he belongs in a zoo."

Page 125: Truth was, Mark was a terrible swimmer. But he put his faith in the fact that using the air globes was as easy as Bobby described. he wasn't going to let something silly like an irrational fear of a horrific death by drowning stop him from seeing Cloral.

Page 144: "I need something to write with," I said. I figured it was time to catch up with my journals. 
Kasha looked at me like I had just announced I was going to grow a second head.
"You can write?" she asked, not hiding her surprise.
"Amazing, but true," I answered snottily. "And I can count too. Want to hear?"

Page 174: There was nothing else to think about. I had already counted the stones in the walls (8,462), done every math problem i could think of, and even came up with my own lyrics to that old song "Smells Like Teen Spirit," since I never understood the real lyrics anyway. Tell me that's not desperate.

Page 259: The town was a strange oasis tucked into the mountains of nowhere. The only thing that would have made it more surprising was if there had been snow and a guy with a red suit who made toys and drove a sleigh.

Page 316: Boon added, "And we're not there yet."
"Hobey!" Spader exclaimed. "Let's be positive."
"Okay," Boon said. "I'm positive we're not there yet."
Spader laughed and said to Boon, "I like you, mate. When this is over I want to show you Cloral."
"You sure about that?" Courtney asked. "Can klees swim?"
"No, we can't," Boon answered. "Would I have to swim if I went to Cloral?"
Courtney, Mark, and Spader exchanged glances, and burst out laughing.

Page 259: "The sprinklers!" Bobby exclaimed. "On the light posts."
"They have sprinklers on light posts?" Courtney asked.
"What's a sprinkler?" Spader asked.



So, there you go, that's all for this summer reading post! Have you read the Pendragon series? What do you think of the series? Let me know in the comments!

I've also created a Facebook page for my blog, so if you want to check that out and like it, you can click HERE. I'll try to keep that pretty up-to-date with new posts and such.

Thanks for reading this! If you like my posts, don't forget to subscribe/follow, since it lets me know that you're enjoying what I'm doing. See y'all soon!

My Chemical Romance- The Black Parade

Hey, y'all! It's time for me to talk about another CD on my shelf! As always, I put my iTunes on shuffle, and the CD containing the first song that played is the one I'll be talking about!

Release Date: October 24, 2006

Genre: Alternative Rock, Pop Punk, Emo

*New Section/ Info*- When I bought the CD: I know it was around Christmastime, because I was with my cousins, and my best guess would be that it was 2009. Not sure why I hadn't bought it earlier, since I got into alternative music in early 2008, but at least we got there!

Track Listing

1. The End
2. Dead!
3. This Is How I Disappear
4. The Sharpest Lives
5. Welcome to the Black Parade
6. I Don't Love You
7. House of Wolves
8. Cancer
9. Mama
10. Sleep
11. Teenagers
12. Disenchanted
13. Famous Last Words
14. Blood [Hidden Track]

My Chemical Romance lineup on this CD:
Gerard Way- lead vocals
Ray Toro- lead guitar
Mikey Way- bass guitar
Frank Iero- rhythm guitar
Bob Bryar- drums

From L-R: Bob, Mikey, Gerard, Frank, Ray

About My Chemical Romance: 
Once again, I've ended up with a pretty well-known band. My Chemical Romance was formed in 2001 and gained significant commercial success in the early 2000s. They released four full length CDs: I Brought You My Bullets, You Brought Me Your Love in 2002, Three Cheers For Sweet Revenge in 2004, The Black Parade in 2006, and Dangerous Days: The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys in 2010. Beginning in 2012, My Chemical Romance released a series of singles/EPs called the Conventional Weapons. Upon the conclusion of these releases in early 2013, the band announced its break-up.

My Opinion about My Chemical Romance:
I find My Chemical Romance kinda hit or miss. There are a couple CDs that I really enjoy by them, and a couple I just don't really enjoy as much. I admire them for their ability to create such great concepts to base albums off of, like they did with The Black Parade and Dangerous Days. While they've never been my favorite band, they do have some really outstanding songs.

About the CD:  

This is probably My Chemical Romance's most well-known and commercially successful CD. This concept album is a rock opera, focusing on a patient dying of cancer. The songs tell the story of his death and reflect upon his life. 

IMHO: 
This is my favorite My Chemical Romance CD. I think it's incredibly well-constructed and cohesive and really enjoy almost all of the songs on the CD. It's really, really great.

As always, I'm going to give each song a rating out of 10 and then give a brief explanation of why it got that rating. 

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The End- 8.5/10. Not too much to say about this one. I like it as an opening song. It starts out relaxed (well, relaxed for MCR) and then gets some MCR crazy thrown in before going straight into Dead!

Dead!- 9/10. I love so many of the lyrics in this song. First of all, "Have you heard the news that you're dead?" but aside from that, there's "If life ain't just a joke, then why am I laughing?"

This Is How I Disappear- 8/10. A pretty average song. Pretty good, but not a standout. I do really enjoy the guitar on this one though. That's definitely the highlight.

The Sharpest Lives- 10/10. I just really love how completely creepy the verses of this song are, and I love the contradiction between that and the chorus. I wasn't a huge fan of this one when I first heard the CD, but it really grew on me, and now it's one of my favorites.

Welcome to the Black Parade- 10/10. Is it really possible to not give this one a 10/10? It's the epitome of the entire CD, and arguably MCR's best song ever. It's certainly the one they're best known for. It's a masterpiece, and I definitely think it's one of their best songs they've ever done.

I Don't Love You- 8.5/10. I've fallen out of love with this one a little, but it's still a really good song. I generally don't tend to gravitate toward slower songs (especially when it's MCR), but this is one that I've always enjoyed.

House of Wolves- 9.5/10. This song is really great. It's got all of the craziness I've come to expect from My Chemical Romance. The guitar and vocals are outstanding on this one, especially in the bridge. So great. 

Cancer- 8/10. I don't have a ton to say about this song. It's good, but for me, it's not a standout. I'm sure there are people who really love this one, but as I said before, slower songs aren't really my thing. And my favorite of Gerard's vocal styles is the harder, in-your-face vocals, like in House of Wolves, not the slower songs. 

Mama- 9.5/10. The creepy factor is so incredibly high on this song, and it's just so incredibly dark but it works really well. Typically, I pay attention to the music more than the lyrics, but the minimal instrumentation on the verses forces you to listen to the dark lyrics. So much love for this song. 

Sleep- 7/10. Forgettable, for me. It's just average. The chorus isn't bad... but I generally don't want to listen to the opening bit, and the rest of the song isn't good enough for me to put up with it. Kudos for making a "Three Cheers" reference though.

Teenagers-10/10. Oh, man. This song. Probably my favorite My Chemical Romance song. The only complaint (which really has nothing to do with the song) is that it doesn't really seem to fit into the CD. I dunno, it just seems like its own separate entity among all of the songs dealing with the patient dying of cancer. But I don't mind because I absolutely love this song. 

Disenchanted- 7.5/10. A little forgettable for me. I had to listen to it to even remember anything about how it sounded. Once I listened, I remembered that I do kinda like it, but it's not one of the better songs on this CD.

Famous Last Words- 9/10. I was really torn between a 9 and a 9.5 for this one, but I went with a 9 just because I often think that I like it more than I really do. It's a good song, but I don't tend to listen to it very much. The chorus is a little flat... probably because it's mostly the same note. But I think the guitar is really cool in this one!

Blood [Hidden Track]- 9/10. This one always makes me laugh. Gerard's vocal style on this is great, and the cheesy ghostly moans in the background are hilarious.

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Favorite Songs: Teenagers, Welcome To The Black Parade, and The Sharpest Lives.

Least Favorite Songs: Sleep and Disenchanted.

Video! 

Welcome To The Black Parade music video

Teenagers music video

Rating: 9.5/10. While the individual songs don't necessarily merit the 9.5, the concept and my overall love for the CD get it up there. I'd prefer to give it like a 9.25, but I don't have a category for that, and don't plan on making one. But, either way, this is a really great, well-written and well thought out CD.


Hope you liked my newest "The CDs on my Shelf" post! Have any questions? What are your opinions on My Chemical Romance? Let me know in the comments. If you like my posts, I'd really appreciate if you'd subscribe/follow, because it lets me know y'all are liking them! Hope you enjoyed! Comment, comment, comment! I love feedback! Thanks for reading!